U.S. Presidential Documents

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Harvard College Library's Government Information Services are housed in Lamont Library. This is a central reference and referral point for United States government information. As a federal depository it houses a comprehensive collection of presidential documents.

Part 1 of the following guide lists some of the most useful research tools related to presidential material and notes the location of the collections. Part 2 lists presidential material in microform, some are extensive collections of letters and papers, others may be more ephemeral works. Part 3 is a chronological list of all U.S. Presidents, with birth and death dates, years of each individual's term, and the corresponding session of Congress.

1. Presidential Documents and Reports by Type:

Web Links to the Executive Branch

USA.Gov Federal Executive Branch provides links to the Executive Office of the President including the White House office and agencies such as the National Security Council and the Office of Management and Budget. Also links to executive agencies.

Public Statements of the President

Electronic

The American Presidency Projectcontains over 52,000 documents related to the study of the American Presidency including Public Papers from Hoover to present, Inaugural addresses and State of the Union messages from Washington to most recent; also radio addresses, convention speeches, presidential candidate debates, audio and video selections, data on popularity, public appearances , election statistics and more.

Presidential Papers is a full text, indexed database on CD-ROM containing presidential papers from Washington through Clinton, previously published in Messages and Papers of the Presidents and Public Papers of the Presidents. Location: Documents (Lamont): CD-ROM Doc J81.3.P74 199x

Official conversations and meetings of Dean Acheson, 1949-1953Location: Microforms (Lamont): Film W 6816

Minutes and documents of the cabinet meetings of President Eisenhower, 1953-1961Location: Microforms (Lamont): Film A 326

Minutes of telephone conversations of John Foster Dulles and of Christian Herter (1953-1961)Location: Microforms (Lamont): Film A 327

Minutes and documents of the cabinet meetings of President JohnsonLocation: Microforms (Lamont): Film A 407

Daily diary of President Johnson (1963-1969)Location: Microforms (Lamont): Film A 408

Other Papers

The "Papers" of many presidents are held in microform. These may be found by checking in HOLLIS Classic Catalog under the name of the president, or using the Extended Search mode of Hollis, under the name of the president as author and under "Microforms" in location.

Increasingly, efforts are being made to provide digitized presidential papers. Some examples include:

Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower from The Johns Hopkins University Press via E-Resources is a collection
including documents from the Eisenhower Presidential Library, as well as private collections and public archives in the U.S. and U.K.

Presidential libraries may also provide needed information. They may include selected speeches, diaries, letters, etc. as well as information about the archive. National Archives Presidential Libraries provides links to the Presidents' museums and libraries from President Hoover to the most recently established presidential library.

Some of the earlier Presidential papers are also being made available electronically by institutions such as the Library of Congress. Although some are still only in their early stages there are some noteworthy collections:

The Thomas Jefferson Papers
The papers may be searched by keyword or browsed by series. The largest of these, General Correspondence, comprises almost two-thirds of the total collection and includes letters, memoranda, notes, drafts of documents, small maps, drawings, and designs.